Reflection Paper

Reflection Paper on Person One assignment Stephanie Meese Psychology Professor Lemons

Before reading and learning about the process a human being goes through from birth through adolescents, I only knew a little !hat I did know was from pregnancy books, that e"plained in weekly stages how your baby is de#eloping In this course I learned more of the details and far more of the entire process from conception all the way through death Something I found #ery interesting was the conception process and how the embryo starts as an organism $rom that moment it grows and faces new challenges as well as stages, and continues to grow into a little human %he different stages such as& %he 'erminal period, %he (mbryonic Period and %he $etal Period, were so informal to read about Its so fascinating to me, to think we can make another human being from )ust two people a male and a female *nother thing I learned that caught my attention was the different complications that can come up with the newborn, such as disorders and diseases %here are many different reasons and causes that gi#e a newborn+s a greater chance to be affected by this, such as genes !hen a fetus is affected by for e"ample, ,own Syndrome most of the time the parents are aware before birth occurs %hrough -ltra Sounds a de#ice that lets you #iew a fetus on a black and white screen, as well as blood tests, parents usually ha#e a chance to terminate the pregnancy if they choose and it is early enough in the pregnancy Many new parents do terminate, due to the fear of many different outcomes My best friend howe#er has a child that is eight years old, and he has Spina Bifida She is the most ama.ing mother I know, and gi#es her son e#erything she has She lo#es him more than anything and does anything she can to help him /e recently had to undergo a #ery e"tensi#e spine surgery to relie#e fluid from his spine Lea#ing the fluid in, would ha#e resulted in losing all body functions, when all he has left is feeling in his arms and hands /e also had a greater chance of death if fluid was left in She went through great lengths in order to sa#e her son and continue to make sure he is comfortable and lo#ed Raising a baby through *dolescents with a birth defect would be e"tremely hard and #ery draining, but those that do it are a true inspiration to me 0nowing more about the different defects that can occur in a child can help me understand these types of issues better as well as knowing how they occur In my line of work I1m ma)oring in 2Social !ork3, I will need a clear understanding on this as well as children and adolescents

I really en)oyed learning about *dolescent changes as well, because I can apply the knowledge to my son who is ten I ha#e a clearer understanding on what to e"pect, how to handle it and what I can do to help in making things a little smoother for him I ha#e always had a concern with bullying, that being bully1s as well as those being bullied %o me it is heartbreaking and I would do whate#er I could to help a child facing this issue I learned that its #ery important to be in#ol#ed with your children asking 4uestions and obser#ing beha#ior I ha#e always been #ery open with both my boys and ask them often how school is going and if anyone is mean to them I also make sure to ask if they are being mean to anyone that may be different I try to teach them it+s ne#er okay to be mean, and if they see someone being bullied to speak up I ha#e learned so much in this class, that I could keep going, but I know I can+t I am lea#ing this class with so much information and I feel confident that I can use it in many different ways throughout my life I want to thank you Professor Lemons for all you ha#e done I really en)oyed your class, and hopefully I will take another class of your+s